


wikipedia for bad guys

by RandomRuth



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: F/M, Humour, I have nothing against you Wikipedia I love you, Loki's up to mischief, Pepperony - Freeform, The Avengers Tower can be a lonely place, Tony Stark Loves A Woman, Tony cooks himself some dinner, the rating is only really because the situation is a bit tense and Tony uses the f-word
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-05
Updated: 2018-09-05
Packaged: 2019-07-07 09:48:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15905847
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RandomRuth/pseuds/RandomRuth
Summary: “Knowledge is power. I’ve done my homework on you, Tony Stark. I have infiltrated every level of your stinking society, forged relationships with pathetic, greedy humans, journeyed far to learn what I could about the Man of Iron. His fears, his weaknesses. I know you now, Tony Stark. Intimately.”Tony shivers because that — that is creepy. “Google.”“What?”“You could have just Googled me, it would have saved you a whole lot of time. Just saying.”(It's been five months since the Avengers kicked him up his royal green behind, and now Loki's back and this time he's ready. He's going to bring down the Avengers one by one, starting with Tony Stark...)





	wikipedia for bad guys

Having Pepper as CEO of Stark Industries is really great, it is — she’s incredibly capable, she’s ridiculously well organised… she’s also not here, at the Tower, with him, which is where his heart really wants her to be. The Avengers (née Stark) Tower may be her baby, but Stark Industries is her moody teenager, the board of directors needing constant reassurance about one thing or another, and the press pouncing on her every move.

Pepper’s not here — likely averting another crisis — so Tony tinkers in his workshop and tries not to think about how every sound echoes in this large, empty space. He has JARVIS start up his workshop playlist, volume as loud as is comfortable, and then just a little louder for good measure. He works with the New York skyline to his back, and he doesn’t notice that the light is fading outside until his stomach rumbles and he looks around for the cup of coffee he brought in here — he checks his watch — ten hours ago.

It’s then that Tony notices the emptiness — not just the usual kind, in his heart when Pepper isn’t here, but in his stomach. He can’t remember the last time he ate something. He collects his coffee cup, three-quarters empty and stone cold, and takes the stairs two at a time to the floor above. Tony has a floor dedicated to labs and workshops, oil and dirt and metal, and then there’s here — a homely space with Pepper’s favourite artworks on the walls, her coat hung up by the door and her cookbooks neatly placed in a row on a little shelf above the counter.

Tony deposits his cup in the sink and goes to the fridge, smiling softly to himself at the photograph stuck to the fridge’s door of Pepper and himself in Budapest, a rare escape from it all. She’s smiling and he’s smiling and the sun is shining down upon them. They look happy. They’re always happy so long as they are together.

Pepper has labelled some leftover takeout in the fridge but Tony turns his nose up at it. He sighs, closes the door — the colourful spine of one of Pepper’s cookbooks catches his eye. The truth is that Pepper is a pretty decent cook, she just rarely has the time — Tony is an excellent cook, but a very slow one, so he rarely bothers unless he’s in a particular mood (dying, or in this case, lonely).

He plucks the book from the shelf — it’s a collection of healthy Italian recipes. He flicks through it until he settles on something he knows he’ll like. He starts opening cupboards, collecting ingredients and utensils…

A little under an hour later there is tomato sauce everywhere but a heaped plate of spaghetti bolognese is on the kitchen island. The smell alone makes Tony’s mouth water, his stomach rumble loudly. This meal is all about comfort — he dims the kitchen lights, has JARVIS switch on the fireplace hologram, fetches a candle. He sinks into the nearby couch, leather creaking, the plateful of spaghetti on his lap, and channel surfs until he finds a programme about restoring cars.

He twirls his fork in his spaghetti and shoves it in his mouth, and it doesn’t taste quite right. With difficulty Tony pulls himself out of the couch cushions and returns to the kitchen half of the room. He finds the salt shaker with no problem — it’s a fancy designer one that should have a twin, but there doesn’t seem to be any sign of the pepper shaker or indeed any pepper at all. Tony chuckles to himself that even pepper the condiment is too busy to spend time with him.

He returns to his dinner with just the salt shaker, breathing out and relaxing again as he sinks into the couch cushions. He has almost cleared his plate when JARVIS’s fireplace hologram below the television flickers a few times then cuts out completely. “JARVIS?” Tony asks.

“Not JARVIS,” a familiar voice says, and the spaghetti in Tony’s stomach turns to lead and he feels sick. Another hologram replaces the fireplace one, but this time it’s a face. “It is I, Loki of Asgard,” Loki announces grandly.

A cold sweat prickles on the back of Tony’s neck and he tries to get his heart rate under some sort of control, but his voice is steady. “Oh yeah, I remember you — you’re Thor’s brother, right?”

He says it because he can and because he knows he’ll get a reaction — and sure enough, Loki closes his eyes and takes a deep breath as if he’s holding back a violent outburst. Tony allows himself a crooked smirk at the tiny victory, but then Loki recovers and starts talking again.

“Knowledge is power, that is a universal constant. When I faced you and your... _friends_ in combat, I did not have the necessary information gathered about you all. I took you each to be insects, easily squashed under the weight of my boot, but now I know better—”

“Because we kicked your ass?” Tony finishes for him, bravado masking his true intention — to work out where Loki is. It looks like some kind of warehouse — he must be somewhere on Earth, then. Okay.

“ _No_ — you didn’t ‘kick my ass’,” Loki says as if Tony is an idiot for even suggesting it, but the swiftness of his reply tells a different story. “You were simply... fortunate.”

“You keep telling yourself that, pal.”

“As I was _saying_ ,” Loki goes on, choosing to ignore Tony’s interruption, “knowledge is power. I’ve done my homework on you, Tony Stark. I have infiltrated every level of your stinking society, forged relationships with pathetic, greedy humans, journeyed far to learn what I could about the Man of Iron. His fears, his weaknesses. I know you now, Tony Stark. Intimately.”

Tony shivers because that — _that_ is creepy. “Google,” he says, tone deliberately light.

Loki blinks and Tony smirks, having clearly wrongfooted him again. “What?”

“You could have just Googled me, it would have saved you a whole lot of time. Just saying.”

Loki starts speaking over him. “During the course of my research, one word kept appearing over and over—”

Tony holds his breath.

“ _Pepper_.”

Tony doesn’t breathe out. He stops doing that thing that you do with your nose, where you suck air into your lungs and then blow it out again. It’s something about oxygen…? Tony’s vision goes kind of fuzzy and at last he breathes out, gasps for air. He’s shaking, all the work he did to appear in control undone. When his vision clears, Loki is grinning at him, wide and toothy.

Tony curls his hands into tight fists at his side as he gets up from the couch, his sweat causing his clothes to stick to the leather. Successfully peeled free, he strides towards the hologram of Loki.

“If you have harmed her…” he starts to threaten, shaking with fear and rage, but Loki just laughs in his face. Something in Tony snaps. “Hey, _fuckface_ , this isn’t a joke. If she’s alive, I’m coming for you and nothing you throw at me is gonna stop me, _nothing_ , and you’d better start running now because I’m a determined bastard and you’re gonna need the head start — and if she’s — she’s…” He closes his eyes, his throat dry. He can’t even say it. His chest is heaving.

Loki just raises an eyebrow at him. “If you’re quite finished, your Pepper is alive,” he says casually, like he couldn’t care either way, “for now.”

“Tony?”

 _Pepper_. It’s her voice. God, she’s so brave — she doesn’t even sound scared. He loves her so much, she’s so brave, incredible —

But wait.

Her voice had come from behind Tony, not the hologram —

Tony whips around on the spot, almost falls over in the process, and there she is, his _Pepper_ , whole, unhurt, beautiful — god, she’s so beautiful, standing there, framed by kitchen cabinets that are now stained with tomato sauce. Tony lets out a little choke-sob.

“Tony, what —”

She doesn’t get to finish her question — Tony runs towards her, a blur of sweat and anxiety and sheer _relief_ — and holds onto her so tight it must hurt, and he worries and tries to pull away a little bit but she keeps holding him close, running a hand through his hair. “It’s okay, Tony, I’m fine,” she soothes, gentle, and he owes her an explanation but he can’t quite talk right now. He just breathes her in because he can do that now. He can breathe.

“Can we have a sleepover tonight?” Tony asks quietly, his voice muffled by Pepper’s shoulder. “Just us? I miss you.”

“Sure,” she breathes, and squeezes him a little tighter. “I would love that. I miss you too.”

God, he loves this woman. He could cry.

Behind Tony, Loki clears his throat, breaking the spell. Tony reluctantly turns away from Pepper, but he holds her hand to make sure she stays. “What?” Tony asks, rudely, as a thought hits him — Pepper is here, yes, squeezing his hand, but if Pepper is here then who does Loki have hostage? He imagines some poor, innocent person, terrified out of their mind. His first instinct is to run downstairs and suit up _right now_ , but he needs to gather more information first. He holds his ground. “I want to see her,” Tony demands authoritatively.

Loki rolls his eyes. “Of course you do,” he replies, long-suffering. The hologram shifts, like a camera panning, until Tony can see a metal table, and upon it —

Pepper gasps. “Is that my _pepper shaker?_ ”

**Author's Note:**

> Oh, you thought this was a serious fic, did you? Hehehe. I just wrote all of these words for a dumb pun and I have no regrets. 
> 
> This is a complete overhaul of a fic I posted on fanfiction.net in November 2013.
> 
> I'm on Tumblr! tonyuhstark.tumblr.com


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